Jie had set Victoria and I up in adjoined rooms nice enough that I would have only bought them myself if I'd just finished the job of a lifetime. The main centrepiece of my room was a brilliant blue fish tank decorated with plants and colourful fish that my PA told me were from Africa on Earth.

They certainly knew how to flaunt their wealth on Station 26.

The window on the far wall of the room didn't look out over the main promenade of the Pent, nor did it look out into space; both of those would have been too convenient. Instead, it had a view of the 'Jewel of Station 26,' the rare mineral casino that had stood here through several regime changes and funded each of them.

Mining lithium on Station 26 was a fantastic way to make a fortune, which meant that the Station needed a reckless amount of ways to lose it.

On the ground below us, a series of cars and bikes constantly pulled into the Casino for what I imagined was the 'Evening' rush. Stations didn't sleep, and Station 26 certainly wasn't an exception to that rule, but evening and nightlife were still marketing terms.

Moving into the evening meant that I was expecting a knock soon; that would have been completely Jie's speed. Either that or it would be Tash banging on the door and telling me that we needed to go get drinks which was completely her speed, just in a different way.

It had been quiet in my room for a while. Victoria hadn't been able to sleep on the ship while worrying about the battery, so she'd gone to bed while I'd started pacing the second we arrived.

At least we were past the worst version of landing on Station 26; someone new being in power and considering me a friend of the old order.

Of course, it wasn't clear whether our current situation was better.

I ran my thumb over the edge of the unmarked credit chips in my pocket. I should have tried to offer the kid more, get him to fix the ship and get us off the Station before-

Before what? Before Tas- Natasha finished her elevator ride? She was on the way down before we'd stepped off the ship. Unless we'd come here in Victoria's ship, I would get clocked the second I landed with Gunboat Diplomat.

It may be time to get a new ship after all. I could afford it instead of a vacation with the payout from Victoria, or I'd have to repair the ship so many times that I couldn't afford anything other than replacement engines.

I gave up on brooding out the window and grabbed a chair and a datapad I'd brought from the ship to avoid using anything station-provided. I didn't need anyone having easy access to my search history or what I was scanning around the ship.

For now, I mostly just didn't need people knowing that I was looking up Fotuans, or at least trying to; Pasoné, as far as most of the web was concerned, had no relation to the Fotuan Meritocracy. I barely got a trillion results when I searched the name and most of the results related to a Daggeral celebrity from three centuries ago.

That tracked.

I placed the datapad down in my lap and sighed. Compared to other Empires, the Fotuan Meritocracy kept things under lock and key. Even if she was the only person in the entire Galaxy with that name, there might have been nothing about her on the web at all.

Fuck. Was I really going up against the Meritocracy? Dad would be proud.

"Anything yet?" Victoria asked as she opened the door from her room to mine. Combined, our pair of lavish rooms were almost offensive. She'd wrapped herself in a hotel-provided robe that was clearly cut for around six feet as opposed to nearly seven; the emerald colour was stark against her silver-white skin.

"Nobody's come for us yet, no."

"But they're going to?"

"Mhm."

Victoria sat down beside me and pushed her hair over to the shaved side, smoothing it once before crossing her legs on the seat. "I was thinking," she started leaving space for a sarcastic remark.

I declined.

"We should come up with a strategy for how to handle everything-"

"You were fine on the docks."

"Oh."

"Everyone here is going to expect that attitude from you so-"

"Everyone everywhere expects it," she corrected, "it's accurate."

"Mostly."

"Mostly?"

"You've chilled," I offered her a pointed look to communicate that the Victoria I'd met at the bar wasn't about to walk out to 'have a chat.'

"Pardon that."

"I wasn't complaining."

"It's unbecoming."

"It's better for our relationship," I added. There was a lot I was leaving out there, but it wasn't the best idea to spend time trying to spell out 'I actually enjoy your company when you're not being a prick' or 'it helps to not be babysitting a brat.'

This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

We both knew. Firefights were great for keeping people attached.

"One thing about it. Downstairs that is."

"Yeah?"

"Just call me Kingston, don't call me by my last name."

"I thought that was a human thing."

"It is, but it's not an Ovishir one."

"But-"

"People he- The people who know me here are going to think it's weird if you call me by my last name," I explained, "it implies that we're really close. It's better if we keep everyone thinking that we're just arm's length from one another. Or at least try."

"Try?"

"They know me pretty well. I'll try, but people like Tash will be good at reading me. For example, she probably knows that I really don't want to be here."

"You know them that well?"

"Yeah."

"But you're not going to explain it?" she asked.

Down in front of the Casino, a massive, lumbering mining machine that had been repurposed with gold thundered up to the front walkway before opening to dispense a collection of passengers too far for me to clock.

"No. It's not my favourite topic."

"You have a lot of not favourite topics."

"You don't seem that keen to talk about your situation," I pointed out.

Victoria chuckled, "that's fair."

"I did a lot of work here with a lot of powerful people," I explained, "they're big fans, but I'm not that proud of it."

"Are you proud of a lot of your work?"

"Not much," I sighed, "I do the right thing sometimes but-"

"Sometimes you blow up a Mythellion Research station?"

"Yinde deserved that."

"Are you proud of it?"

"I'm neutral," I lied, "feel bad that I disappointed Musc."

Victoria wrinkled her nose and shifted in her chair. "I thought you were going to use the excuse that they were Yinde's bombs."

"Nah," was all I offered. Victoria had been forced to pull the trigger twice in her life, from what I understood, so I didn't want to explain the calculus of blame to her like my Mom had to for me. Sometimes it was you or them, and that was okay, but if you kept trying to shift the responsibility for the people you killed to the actions of others, you'd be able to explain away anything.

That responsibility, according to her, was the difference between people who shot first and people who shot when they didn't need to.

"I killed him. He would have killed us. I was better at it," I continued after a second longer, staring out the window at the crew still unloading parts from the mining vessel. "Tale old as time."

"Hm," was all that Victoria had to offer in response for the moment. If I let it linger too long, she would get trapped thinking about what she'd done on Mythellion.

"What about you?"

"What?"

"Proud of what you do?"' I asked.

Victoria offered me a quizzical look and then turned her attention back out the window. "I-" she bit her lip, "what I do- did, for the Meritocracy wa- is…"

She trailed off, but I understood the last part, 'well, I'm not doing it, so take a guess.'

"You're young," I cut in to give her an out, "you'll figure it out."

"Yeah," Victoria agreed in a way that meant 'hopefully.'

Someone pounded on the door.

I waved Victoria back to her side of the room, and she shut the door behind her before I opened mine.

Tash was at the door, still in a flight suit but missing the apron and grime that came with her work clothes. She still looked like she was one of the dock managers, just an off-duty one.

"Hey you," she greeted while trying to get a look around me to see if anyone else was in the room.

"Vic's in hers."

"Mind if I come in then?"

"Am I allowed to say no?"

There was a pause long enough that one of us should have cut in to break it.

"I'm not here for Jie," she finally said.

"Come on in."

Tash pushed past me before I was fully out of the way, ignoring the lavish decor to focus on the Nurse, which I'd left lying in the corner. She regarded it for a moment but never moved to grab it. "It's been a while since you invited me in."

"What's up?" I asked, closing the door behind us and dodging her attempts to bring up the past as soon as she was inside. Tash continued to stare at the Nurse instead of revealing whether that bothered her.

"Can't I just be coming in to check on a friend?"

"You can," I nodded, "but you aren't."

Tash clicked her tongue.

"What's up?"

"Just serendipity for me that you're here. Need someone for something, and I don't think I'd want anyone else on this station doing it."

"Nobody on the station?"

"You shouldn't trust people from Songlai," she pointed out, using the old nickname instead of anything formal.

"That includes you."

Tash sighed. "I'm aware."

"But?"

"But you and I have history."

We did. I wasn't sure if that helped her case.

"You think I enjoy asking you for help the second I get here?"

"No."

"Then why do you think I'm asking?"

"Because you know I'm good," I suggested.

"Desperate," she corrected, "I don't have many places to go."

"Burned a lot of bridges?" I asked. I knew the answer was yes, but it wasn't like Tash to admit that she was a serial arsonist.

"Working for Jie doesn't get you many fans these days."

"You work for Jie?"

"Everyone on Station works for Jie. Some of us just admit it," she finally turned away from the Nurse to turn back at me. Her eyes had a pleading sparkle, but I'd seen that weaponized before, "everyone else just pretends that their boss doesn't funnel money to Jie, or isn't part of some bullshit network that isn't technically working for her."

"Can't choose who your boss pays."

Tash glared at me but didn't argue against my point.

"What do you need?"

"You have to promise you'll do it if I tell you, can't have it getting out."

"Fuck that."

"Kingston…"

"No, you don't have that privilege."

"Kingson we're-"

"Natasha, you're a client," I cut her off and corrected her simultaneously, "and I have work right now, so I'm not about to drop everything for this."

Natasha looked away toward the window and sighed, running one hand through her hair. There were so many more scars than last time I'd seen her.

I went to open the door for her.

"You're right," she answered instead of moving, "you're right. Look, is there anything you need with the ship? What put that hole in it?"

"I can pay for repairs."

"What put the hole in it?"

There I was again, pressed up against the wall of giving information away that I didn't necessarily want to. That said, the good thing about Station 26 being an unregulated hell hole was its access to systems that might punch through their shields next time. After all, the radar cloaking that allowed us barely escape around Mythellion was from here. "Valikyria"

"What?"

"Fotuan Valikyria. That's what shot the ship."

Tash glanced over at the door to Victoria's room. "What the fuck does she have you doing that you're scrapping with Fotty tech?"

"I'm not discussing that."

"Valikyrias are serious shit."

"So I learned."

"Are you in over your head?"

That was a good question, but I was confident the answer was almost assuredly yes, "No."

She frowned, then nodded, "You get any hits in?"

"If I did, it didn't matter."

"Need firepower?"

"Can you offer something worth what you're asking?"

Natasha walked over to the window but didn't take the seat that I'd been using with Victoria. Instead, she stared out over the Casino. "We have some de-fib rounds on station right now. I can call people on some debts and get them to you."

"That's one hell of a favour."

"I did try to get you to agree without hearing what it was. Those should be enough, though, yeah?"

"I reserve the right to refuse."

"Dick."

"That's not being a dick," I corrected, "that's just not being as dumb as I used to be."

"I liked the old version."

"You would." I watched her reflection sneer at my comment. "Do you want to tell me or not?"

"Fine," she began, "but we have to do it tonight."